48 Blocks Later

I finally finished the 48 Storm at Sea blocks I needed to put together a king-sized quilt. The stack is 7-inches thick.

Let me introduce you to one of my sewing machines: My old New Home. Now let me introduce you to my worst enemy:

The bobbin casing. For some reason I can never get the bobbin case to pop into its socket. I have to push and push while moving the needle up and down and maybe after five minutes of struggling it decides to go in. For that reason, I dislike it when I run out of bobbin thread.

I'm very unlucky in the sewing department. I'm surprised that I've worked in the field of fabric art for as long as I have, because Murphy's Law is in full effect when I am sewing. I got down to the last few stitches on the last block, and the bobbin thread ran out. Had that extra few inches of thread been there, I could have been done for the night. Instead I had to tack another half hour onto my sewing time while I prepared half a dozen bobbins with thread and then fussed to get that bobbin case to pop in.

Why do half a dozen bobbins need to be threaded? Because it saves me the trouble of having to unthread and then rethread the top thread each time I need to wind another bobbin. Once I get that tension set, I don't want to mess around with the threading.

Now all I've got to do is make a decision on how to join those blocks together. I was thinking of blending dark to light based upon the darkest hue in the block, but realized that some blocks might fit or match the seams better than whichever shade is next in line. I'm thinking I should join them up in a semi-random fashion, the only two deciding factors being if the seams match well and that the greens are spread out. The majority of the quilt is black, white, blue, and purple, but there is some green to make it pop. Since the green stands out, it has to be placed in a balanced manner.